It is a story of four lower middle class unemployed young men in Mumbai who feel disconnected with society and are wasting their lives away, when new neighbours, a young beautiful girl Anita and her grandmother, change their perspective. They change their attitude and try and blend in with the normal, honest and hard-working society of 1980s India when Anita is raped at the hands of her employers. However, the culprits are let off for the want of evidence and Anita takes the extreme step of suicide. They then take revenge of each and every culprit in a very novel way. It also shows their distrust in the law of the land. The movie has a tragic end with all four getting capital punishment for doing what they thought was correct, especially so when law of land fails to book the criminals for their wrongdoings.

• Nana Patekar as Ravindra Kelkar aka Ravi
• Nisha Singh as Anita
• Madan Jain as Shashi
• Arjun Chakraborty as Arjun
• Mahavir Shah as Gupta
• Raja Bundela as Saxena
• Rabia Amin as Manda
• Gajanan Bangera as Shashi's elder brother
• Ashalata Wabgaonkar as Anita's Grandmother
• Suhas Palshikar as Laalya

Chandra started his career with Gulzar in 1971, and later also worked as an editor with him. Influenced by Gulzar's Mere Apne (1971) and bringing in his experiences growing up in Mumbai, Chandra wrote a story of four frustrated unemployed men who roam the streets of Mumbai. He even based the character Ravindra upon the role played by Vinod Khanna in the original. The role of Ravindra was written with leading actor of Marathi cinema, Ravindra Mahajani in mind, however, later when Chandra couldn't afford him, however Nana Patekar was eager to do the same role and signed on for Rs. 10,000.^[2]

Although a small budget film with then unknown actors, the film was a big hit in Mumbai (then Bombay) as it realistically depicted social conditions prevailing then in the aftermath of famous Mumbai (then Bombay) cotton textile mills strike which rendered thousands jobless. The film stars a very young Nana Patekar, and has an excellent and memorable Bhajan of Indian Cinema : "Itni Shakti Humen De Na Daata" (???? ????? ???? ???? ????) by Ghanshyam Wasvani.

Writer, Editor, Director and co-producer N.Chandra earned both popular and also critical acclaim for this film. N. Chandra scored a hat-trick at the box office with his first three films, Ankush (1986), Pratighaat (1987) and Tezaab (1988).^[1] Ankush has earned the status of a cult classic over time, and the ending scene which symbolizes their hanging in front of the India Gate has received much attention. The film is one of the very first realistic depictions of inner city adolescents growing up in an atmosphere of social and economic deprivation.

The film was remade in Tamil as Kavithai Paada Neramillai and in Kannada as Ravana Rajya.